Relationship between tourists' environmental responsibility behavior and food preference in agricultural heritage sites: A case study of Qingtian Rice-fish Culture System

Traditional food is an important tourism resource in agricultural heritage sites, and tourists' diet preferences affect their choice of tourism products. As an important part of sustainable tourism research, tourists' environmental responsibility behavior is of great significance to the sustainable development of tourism destinations. In order to investigate the relationship between tourists' environmentally responsible behavior and traditional food tourism preferences, a case study was conducted in the Qingtian Rice-fish Culture System, a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS) site. The following three factors of tourists' environmentally responsible behavior were determined, which were traditional food cognitive factors, environmentally responsible attitude factors, and environmentally responsible behavior factors. At the same time, three types of tourists' traditional food preferences were established, which were pursuing traditional food flavors, participating in traditional food experiences, and pursuing traditional food cultural experiences, which accounted for 38.05%, 35.63%, and 26.31%, respectively. Among them, tourists who pursued traditional food flavors focused on the taste type, environment, and other eating experiences of the food; tourists who participated in traditional food experiences concentrated on the food production process and part of the cultural connotation; and tourists who experienced the culture of traditional food paid more attention on local cultures, ecological protections, applications of local food materials, and the cultural value transmitted by the traditional food. The three environmentally responsible behaviors of tourists who valued traditional food cultural experiences were the strongest, and that of tourists who valued traditional flavors were the weakest. Finally, the regression analysis of tourists' environmentally responsible behavior factors and traditional food preference factors showed a positive correlation. However, we should consider the food preference of different types of tourists in agricultural heritage sites and avoid the problems of food culture destruction and ecological security in order to attract public tourists.